City to publicize busway project

City to publicize busway project

JAKARTA: Although the city administration has postponed the busway project for at least eight months, the transportation agency said that it would still publicize the project and planned to install dividers along the roads it would use.

"We'll start to publicize the project in November because it's ready to be implemented," City Transportation Agency chief Rustam Effendi said here on Sunday.

He added that the publicity would be carried out by, among other things, trying to operate three buses along the roads to be used for the project. The buses would not take passengers, but instead would only travel in both directions from Blok M, South Jakarta, to Kota, West Jakarta.

According to him funds for the project had not been reallocated for financing other projects, as had been reported by the media before. "We've only used some of it on the publicity program," he said. But he refused to say how much had been spent.

In a revision to the 2002 city budget, which was approved last Friday, some Rp 650 million of the project's total allocation of Rp 54 billion will be used in the publicity program, with the remainder for buying a number of buses and constructing infrastructure to support the project. --JP